Video: Manipulating long shutter speeds

In the last couple of the movies, you've seen us directly manipulating the light in our scene. You see how we used ISO to control how much the light we were adding was burning into our scene, and we used a very long shutter speed to give ourselves lots of time to work. We were still using aperture to think about depth of field. We set our ambient light first and then went to work painting with light. We were thinking of light as a commodity, as something we can pour onto the frame, as something we could simply add to the image as we chose. This is one of the advantages of low- light photography, where we can have this long shutter speed that gives us lots of time to work and that gives us lots of time to slowly add light to different parts of our scene.

Join photographer and teacher Ben Long as he describes the tools, creative options, and special considerations involved in shooting with a DSLR camera at night or in low-light conditions, such as sunset or candlelight. The course addresses exposure decisions such as choice of aperture and shutter speed and how they impact depth of field and the camera's ability to freeze motion.

Ben also shows how to obtain accurate color balance in tungsten and fluorescent lighting situations, and how to postprocess the images in Photoshop to remove noise caused by higher ISO settings. He also demonstrates accessories that can greatly expand your low-light photography options.

Manipulating long shutter speeds

In the last couple of the movies, you've seen us directly manipulating thelight in our scene.You see how we used ISO to control how much the light we were adding wasburning into our scene, and we used a very long shutter speed to give ourselveslots of time to work.We were still using aperture to think about depth of field.We set our ambient light first and then went to work painting with light.We were thinking of light as a commodity, as something we can pour onto theframe, as something we could simply add to the image as we chose.This is one of the advantages of low- light photography, where we can have thislong shutter speed that gives us lots of time to work and that gives us lots oftime to slowly add light to different parts of our scene.

I left the crew in the basement last night with some cameras and they startedplaying around and had a lot of fun doing the light-painting type of thingsthat we've already seen, but while changing the scene before them.They had a camera running and you can see what's going on.Jacob was turning off the lights. Josh was standing at the top of the stairs.Now what's going to happen is Jacob is going to fire a flash at Josh on thestairs and then--there it was--and Josh is standing in one position.Now Josh is moving.

Because it's so dark, the still camera is not picking up any of his movement, andnow Jacob fires a second flash to capture him in the other position.The shutter has been open the same time.So this is a single image. The lights are back on. Let's take a look at whatthey got, and here's the final shot.Josh is shooting himself on the staircase.So it should be pretty obvious to you how this image was built up.Now, there's no Photoshop work here.It's not multiple exposures.It's this one frame, but one flash illuminated Josh while he was on the stairsand didn't spill into the other part of the frame.

While still in darkness, Josh came down the stairs manage not bump in anything,got into next position.Jacob flashed him again.Now for this to work, it was very important that the flashes didn't bleed into each other,that light was only going into half the frame of the first shot, so that theother half stayed dark, and then vice versa after they moved.This is a very simple example of just one thing you can do.They were playing around a lot.Any source of light is something that you can paint onto the frame with.Glow sticks, flashlights, cigarette lighters, any of those kinds of things,anything that casts either direct or diffuse light can create a reallyinteresting effect when it's painted onto the sensor like this.

Probably the three biggest issues you're going to face are whether your ambientlight levels are too high, whether your lights are bleeding into each other, andwhether you or your light source is visible when you don't want it to be.You can play around with all those things by controlling your light better,changing your exposure values to change your ambient light levels, and so on and so forth.The great thing about this is you can do it in any dark room.You don't need anything other than an external flash and to know how to controlyour camera well enough to get that long exposure going.Learning to manipulate light like this, even if you don't ultimately do anythingwith these kinds of images, it's a great way to start thinking, again, about lightas a commodity, about something that you collect on the sensor.

That's a good mindset to have for your regular photo work also.It can give you a different perspective on exposure and how to control naturallyoccurring light in your scene.

There are currently no FAQs about Foundations of Photography: Night and Low Light.

Learn by watching, listening, and doing, Exercise files are the same files the author uses in the course, so you can download them and follow along Premium memberships include access to all exercise files in the library.

Already a member ?

Learn by watching, listening, and doing! Exercise files are the same files the author uses in the course, so you can download them and follow along. Exercise files are available with all Premium memberships.
Learn more

Upgrade to our Annual Premium Membership today and get even more value from your lynda.com subscription:

“In a way, I feel like you are rooting for me. Like you are really invested in my experience, and want me to get as much out of these courses as possible this is the best place to start on your journey to learning new material.”— Nadine H.

Thanks for signing up.

We’ll send you a confirmation email shortly.

Sign up and receive emails about lynda.com and our online training library:

new course releases

newsletter

general communications

special notices

Here’s our privacy policy with more details about how we handle your information.

Keep up with news, tips, and latest courses with emails from lynda.com.

Sign up and receive emails about lynda.com and our online training library:

new course releases

newsletter

general communications

special notices

Here’s our privacy policy with more details about how we handle your information.